The present disclosure relates to an air conditioner.
Air conditioners are household electronic appliances for maintaining indoor air in the most suitable state according to uses and purposes. For example, the air conditioners adjust indoor spaces in a cooling condition in summer and also in a warm heating condition in winter. Also, the air conditioners adjust humidity of the indoor space and indoor air in a pleasant clean condition. In detail, an air conditioner drives a refrigeration cycle in which compression, condensation, expansion, and evaporation processes of a refrigerant are performed to cool or heat the indoor space.
Such an air conditioner may be classified into a separated-type air conditioner in which an indoor unit is separated from an outdoor unit and an integrated-type air conditioner in which the indoor unit is integrated with the outdoor unit as one device. The outdoor unit includes an outdoor heat exchanger for heat-exchanging with outdoor air, and the indoor unit includes an indoor heat exchanger for heat-exchanging with indoor air. The air conditioner may switchably operate in a cooling or heating mode.
When the air conditioner operates in a cooling mode, the outdoor heat exchanger acts as a condenser, and the indoor heat exchanger acts as an evaporator. On the other hand, when the air conditioner operates in a heating mode, the outdoor heat exchanger acts as an evaporator, and the indoor heat exchanger acts as a condenser.
The air conditioner may further include a supercooling heat exchanger for supercooling a refrigerant condensed in the condenser. The main refrigerant that is heat-exchanged in the supercooling heat exchanger may be decompressed and evaporated in the evaporator, and a branch refrigerant that is heat-exchanged in the supercooling heat exchanger may be injected to the compressor. According to the structure of the air conditioner, multi-stage compression may be performed in the compressor.
The applicant of the present invention has filed an application in regard to the above-described idea.
Application No.: 10-2012-0018354, Filed date: Feb. 23, 2012, Title of the invention: Air conditioner
However, according to the related art, since the refrigerant is compressed in only three-stages, the compressor has operation efficiency that is limited to less than a predetermined value.